


(don't) be a stranger

by pennyofthewild



Category: Free!
Genre: Canon Compliant, Future Fic, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-11-17
Updated: 2014-11-17
Packaged: 2018-02-25 19:49:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,013
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2634065
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pennyofthewild/pseuds/pennyofthewild
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Makoto runs into Haruka in an izakaya one August evening in Tokyo.</p>
            </blockquote>





	(don't) be a stranger

**Author's Note:**

> Self-indulgent, horribly written.

Makoto runs into Haruka in an izakaya one August evening in Tokyo.

It is the last place he’d expect to find his erstwhile best friend; Haruka is known for his aversion to crowded public spaces sans pools, but if there’s one thing Makoto is good at, it’s expecting the unexpected, especially where Haruka is concerned. Eighteen years of friendship have taught him that much, at least.

When he’s blinked and made sure he isn’t seeing things, Makoto makes his way through the throng of people separating him from Haruka, drinks in hand. (He’s got two; the second was meant for a classmate, but what the classmate doesn’t know won’t hurt him.) Haruka is seated, awkwardly at a table of two other – complete strangers, by the looks of them – people, arms folded tightly around his torso.

The gesture is so familiar Makoto almost double-checks.

He sets the extra cup down on the table by Haruka’s elbow.

“It’s just like you to come to an izakaya and not drink, Haru-chan,” Makoto says by way of greeting.

Haruka looks up, relief palpable in the clear of his eyes, the almost imperceptible curve of his mouth.

“I’ve told you,” he says, “not to call me Haru-chan.”

***

“You’re wearing your team jersey,” Makoto observes, “you here with them?”

Haruka shrugs, long fingers wrapped around his drink. He hasn’t touched it. It’s comforting, Makoto thinks, that some things never change – unlike the length of Haruka’s hair, brushing his collar, or the line of his jaw, stronger, more pronounced.  “Mm,” he says, “they’re probably around somewhere.”

Makoto smiles. “Okay.”

They lapse into a comfortable sort of silence, during which Makoto swirls the ice in his cocktail and wishes he’d gotten something else. He’d picked it off the menu on impulse, instead of going for something he’s familiar with. Inexperience with alcoholic drinks is one of the many things he and Haruka have in common.

 “How are your classes?” Haruka asks, unexpectedly. It is loud, so he has to raise his voice to be heard over the noise, face reddening with the effort.

Swallowing his surprise, Makoto says, “Good, actually. How about yours?”

“Fine.”

“That’s good. And swimming?”

Haruka nods. “Alright. We’ve got a meet this week. With Keio. I hate tapering.”

“You’re so weird, Haru-chan. Most guys enjoy it.” Makoto laughs. “Good luck with the meet.”

“Thanks.”

Makoto takes another sip of his drink, ice clinking against the glass.

“It’s been a while since we hung out, hasn’t it, Haru? When was the last time?”

Characteristically, Haruka doesn’t say anything, looking down at his hands.

“Feels like just yesterday we moved out here, doesn’t it – but it’s been nearly two years. I guess that’s what happens when you get out of school, get started on your own thing. Time really flies.”

Out of the corner of his eye, Makoto sees Haruka bite his lip. The muscles in Haruka’s forearm, a hair’s breadth from his own, are pulled taut. Makoto isn’t sure if he’s imagining it, but he thinks Haruka might be shaking.

“Sorry,” Makoto says, quietly, gently, “have I made you uncomfortable?”

Haruka shakes his head. Makoto bites back the urge to say something else, mentally counting down from a hundred. At thirty-five, Haruka breathes out in a small sigh. He raises his head, meeting Makoto’s gaze. In the semi-darkness of the izakaya’s interior, his eyes are luminous.

“Makoto,” Haruka says, “I’ve missed you.”

***

At a quarter to eight, Haruka expresses a desire to go home. He leaves his glass untouched on the table, the last of the ice-cubes melting into the drink.

“Let me walk you,” Makoto follows him out of the izakaya.

“You don’t have to,” Haruka tips his head back to look Makoto in the face, hands loosely by his sides.

Makoto smiles. “I want to.” He tucks his hands in his pockets, arm brushing Haruka’s shoulder.

There is a busker standing at a street corner, playing the violin. As they pass him, Makoto sees Haruka drop several crumpled notes into the case. The sound of the music follows them across the intersection, mingled with the shouts of the street vendors and the rumble of car engines.

Makoto has a sudden, vivid mental image of silently walking at Haruka’s elbow: down a street in Iwatobi, which morphs into a four-lane road in the middle of Tokyo, into a sidewalk in some nameless foreign city and back again, on and on, unstopping, in an endless loop.

Haruka stops. Makoto, lost in his own thoughts, nearly runs into him.

“Are you going to come up?” Haruka’s voice penetrates the fog in Makoto’s mind.

Makoto glances at his wrist watch. His eyes take a moment to adjust, focusing on the hands. Eight fifteen. “I should – go,” he says, slowly. “I’ve got, oh, a couple of assignments to complete – ”

“Okay,” Haruka says, and Makoto wonders if he’s imagining it or Haruka really does look disappointed, briefly, before the expression flickers and clears.

 “It was great to see you,” Makoto says, “we should, um, plan the next time.”

Haruka nods. “Sure,” he says, and Makoto watches him turn and walk up the stairs to his apartment building’s main entrance, arms wrapped around himself, head bowed.

He thinks of the loop again, of being caught in an infinite walk-cycle, one of a set of parallel lines, never to intersect. He takes a deep breath.

“Haru,” he calls, and Haruka, on the top step, stops and turns.

“Yes?”

Makoto takes the steps two at a time, his heart somewhere in the general vicinity of his stomach.

“Listen,” he says, gasping a little, and stops to exhale, hands coming up to cup Haruka’s face, forehead coming to a rest against Haruka’s.

 Haruka’s lips are parted slightly, dry and chapped, because Makoto isn’t around to remind him of the usefulness of chap-stick, eyes very blue. Makoto can see his long, thick eyelashes, casting dark barbed shadows over his cheeks. Makoto tilts his head, breathes in the smell of Haruka’s shampoo, the underlying whiff of chlorine.

 “Listen,” Makoto says against Haruka’s mouth, “don’t be a stranger.”

***

 

 

 

 

 

end.

 


End file.
